16.01.1997

Capitalism’s predominant power

From 'The Call', paper of the British Socialist Party, January 11 1917

In every historical period the interests and the ambitions of the various sections of the ruling class can only be realised through and in conformity with the main interest of society, as dictated by the economic needs and conditions of that period ...

In the present war too we see almost everywhere an interlacing of the grand and predominantly imperialist cause of the powerful capitalist classes with minor classes - dynastic, monarchist, clerical, etc - which hope to achieve their ends through the successful realisation of the aims of the predominant cause.

This is the reason why the present war has proved so wonderfully popular throughout the nation in every country; this is also the reason why the majority of socialists in every country is in a position plausibly to deny that the war is a capitalist or imperialist war. The war is so vast in its scope that every conceivable interest or ambition has been able to attach itself to its main issue and thus to obscure to the majority of men its true character and aims.

But any student of the effect which the war is having on the economic and social conditions in every country can already foresee that after the war capitalism more than ever will become the ruling power everywhere and will subordinate and completely absorb every other interest and ambition.

Throughout the world, in belligerent as well as neutral countries, the requirements of the war have called forth a tremendous industrial effort which has resulted in an unparalleled extension of capitalist production, in a complete reconstruction of the technical means of that production through the substitution of new processes for old and of new machinery for that grown obsolete, and in a multiplication, on the one, and concentration on the other hand, of industrial undertakings.

It is no exaggeration to say that in these two and a half years capitalist production has made a stride ... such as would in ordinary circumstances have required at least a quarter of a century ... To this re-invigorated capitalism this war has not been a ‘waste’ ...

The future will, therefore, see a great change in the composition and character of the ruling class. The feudal and landlord section, hitherto very powerful even in the most advanced and predominant in the less advanced capitalist countries, will be reduced in size and influence, while the purely capitalist section will enormously gain in both directions ...

The situation will thus be clearer ... Everywhere, in Russia as in Germany, the Junker element will have been driven to the background by the new material and moral power of the capitalist bourgeoisie, and what now obscures our vision - the vision, we mean, of socialists and of the working class in general - will be dissipated.

One solid front of capitalism; against it the front of the proletariat: how long will it take before the latter realises the need of building up its front in the same uniform and solid fashion as that which distinguishes the front of its enemy?

John Bryan